A tire pressure monitoring system (TPMS) has been known that detects the air pressure of a tire mounted on a vehicle, and issues an alarm or the like to the user if the detected air pressure is abnormal. The tire pressure monitoring system includes a detection device that detects air pressure of each tire and wirelessly transmits an air pressure signal concerning the detected air pressure by a radio wave in the UHF band and a monitoring device that receives the air pressure signal wirelessly transmitted from the detection device and monitors the air pressure of each tire based on the air pressure signal received. The detection device is provided in each of the multiple tires while the monitoring device is provided in the body of the vehicle. The monitoring device is connected to multiple low frequency (LF) transmitting antennas that are disposed near the respective tires and individually transmit by a radio wave in the LF band a request signal for requesting air pressure of each tire to respective detection devices. When receiving a request signal transmitted from the monitoring device, each detection device detects air pressure of each tire and wirelessly transmits an air pressure signal including the detected air pressure information to the monitoring device. The monitoring device receives the air pressure signal transmitted from each of the detection devices and monitors air pressure of each tire.
However, a request signal transmitted to the detection device of one tire may be received by this detection device as well as by a detection device of another tire, which may cause the multiple detection devices to transmit air pressure signals. Furthermore, detection devices provided in the tires of the adjacent vehicles may transmit air pressure signals to the monitoring device in response to the request signal. When thus receiving the air pressure signal from a detection device other than the intended detection device, the monitoring device may monitor the air pressure by using erroneous air pressure information.
In addition, when air pressure signals are simultaneously transmitted from multiple detection devices to the monitoring device, interference may occur between the air pressure signals, which prevents the monitoring device from receiving the air pressure signals.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2005-193861 discloses a tire pressure monitoring system in which a monitoring device transmits a request signal including tire identification information and vehicle identification information to a detection device. The detection device determines whether or not the tire identification information and the vehicle identification information that are included in the received request signal match with tire identification information and vehicle identification information that are previously registered, and transmits an air pressure signal to the monitoring device if it is determined that both of them match with each other.
In the tire pressure monitoring system thus configured, no air pressure signal is transmitted from a detection device other than the intended detection device.
In order for four tires to evenly wear out, a tire rotation that interchanges the positions of the tires mounted on a vehicle has typically been performed. The tire pressure monitoring system according to Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2005-193861 makes antennas provided near the respective positions of the tires to transmit tire identification information of the four tires mounted on the vehicle and receives a response from each of the detection devices, thereby determines a positional relation between each tire position and the tire identifying information as well as updates and registers the tire identifying information.